China Launches Emergency Research Program on SARS

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Tuesday, April 15, 2003

China Launches Emergency Research Program on SARS

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The Chinese Ministry of Science and Technology and the Ministry of Health have launched a joint emergency research program on SARS. The 1.2-million-US-dollar program will look into the cause of the disease and effective prevention and treatment measures. It's also meant to enhance China's emergency-response capacity in the event of an outbreak of new contagions.

It's testing time for the nation's medical workers with the cause of SARS not yet identified and its prevention and treatment calling for improvement. To rally the best resources and personnel in the fight against the disease, the Ministry of Science and Technology and the Ministry of Health started a joint research mission on Monday.

Moving with a rarely seen urgency, the Ministry of Science and Technology immediately allocated some 10 million RMB, or some 1.2 million US dollars. An initial fund of 400,000 US dollars has already been put in place.

A ministry spokesman says the project has two objectives. "In the short run, the program focuses on finding effective treatment of SARS patients, identifying its cause and containing its spread. In the long run, the project aims to enhance China's overall preventative and treatment ability of newly��found epidemics. This will be done through further research in such areas as virus screening, speedy diagnosis, disease monitoring and related pharmaceutical development," said Shi Dinghuan, secretary general with the Ministry of Science and Technology.

So far China has gained some headway in the research on SARS. Experts at the Monday meeting say they hope this joint endeavor will help shed light on the remaining tough questions.

"The Chinese diagnosis of SARS has been accepted by the WHO. And while the origin of the disease is unclear, we've worked out quite effective measures to contain it. This is shown in the reduced number of medical workers being affected. There still remains much to be done, and we believe this joint effort will accelerate the research," said Yang Xiaoguang, deputy director of Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

The launching of the program follows a State Council work conference last weekend, at which Premier Wen Jiabao called for decisive action and more scientific research in the fight against the deadly epidemic.

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